


More Than Mackerel

by QueenPotatos



Category: Free!
Genre: Cute, Fluff, M/M, Silly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-03
Updated: 2014-08-03
Packaged: 2018-02-11 15:47:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2073936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueenPotatos/pseuds/QueenPotatos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rin should be careful of where he puts his phone...especially if it ends up in Sousuke's hands.</p>
            </blockquote>





	More Than Mackerel

**Author's Note:**

> It's very silly and it's a cute idea I had at night, as always, before going to bed XD (that moment when I cannot writ anything cause everything is too far and I'm too lazy)  
> I wrote this before chapter 5. You can find it on tumblr somewhere. Unbeta'd ftm.

 

 

  Haru sits in his living room, his phone  still  untouched in front of him, debating internally of what he is about to do. It’s not like he has a choice anyway. The situation is dramatic - catastrophic - urgent.

 

 

 

Nagisa is sad. Like,  awfully sad. Like there is something inside him that seems to have broken and the thought is unbearable.  Nagisa , who is always cheerful, who always drags the group alone with his joyful ness and enthusiasm had been just a shadow of himself lately. It’s almost as if he doesn’t talk to Rei anymore.

The situation was really bad. And it hurts, more than he would have thought.

Because,  Nagisa did so much for them; for him. He had dragged them to the old swim club where they had met  Rin for the first time in years. He had started the swim club. He had found Rei, found the fourth member they needed to be part of the relay - to save  Rin from his own dark thoughts. He did so much, and yet no one seems to notic e how important and decisive he had been because it’s just who  Nagisa is. He had just been himself and naturally things had moved in the way they are now.

It’s not fair for him to be sad. Not when he had given so much. It was time for him to be given something in return. Unfortunately all these good sentiments won’t be enough to solve the problem. Truth is,  Haru had no idea of what to do; really. 

But there might be someone who might help. 

Someone like  Nagisa , someone who can make people smile just by being himself, someone who drags people along with him, someone who had been lost but came back, brighter and happier than before.

Haru takes a deep breath and, finally, he does it. 

He calls  Rin.

*

On the other side of the town, in the  Samezuka’s dorm,  Rin watches his phone vibrate. Someone is calling him but for some odd reason, he can't find the resolve to pick it up.

"Who's that?”  Sousuke asks. He is tired of the noise - he can’t listen to his music peacefully as he usually does before the lights out.

“Haru.”

Sousuke frowns. “Then why don’t you pick it up?”

"He never calls me.”

Rin just blankly stares at the illuminated screen like a chicken who’s found a knife. Eventually, he misses the call. He doesn’t even touch it, he leaves it on his desk as if it was haunted.  Sousuke rolls his eyes.

 

* 

It’s weird that  Rin doesn’t pick up. Is he busy? Maybe he is taking a shower. Maybe he is still swimming to improve his times. Maybe…maybe he doesn’t want to talk to him?

Haru brushes the thought out of his mind.  Rin is probably busy. He’ll try later.

 

* 

Rin jumps with surprise when his phone rings again. He stands up to see who it’s coming from -  but  of course he  kind of already knows the answer.

It’s  Haru. He doesn’t pick up. But  Sousuke really wants to enjoy his music, so he jumps off the top bunk and answers the call instea d of  Rin. 

His face is so priceless, it yells _‘_ _B etrayal!!!'  _ \- with the three exclamation points yes -  but it’s not like  Sousuke cares. He is just tired of  Rin’s childish romantic love stuck behavior.

“Nanase…yes he is here…okay, wait a second - it’s about your blond friend, he wants your advice.”

Rin’s eyes get worried.  “Nagisa ? What happened?”

"He didn’t tell me. It’s you he wants, after all."

Rin blushes and, eventually, takes the call.  Sousuke watches him walk in round in the room for almost half an hour.  Rin can’t stop touching his hair while they’re talking, and he doesn’t know if he should laugh or hide behind his pillow of second hand embarrassment.

When  Rin hangs up, he has that happy, satisfied smile on his face; something only  Nanase can do to him and somehow  Sousuke feels a little bit jealous. Just a little bit.

Rin sighs.

_’ Love stuck. _ _'_ he thinks. "Hey,"  Sousuke says to catch his attention.

"What?"  Rin answers, on the defensive again - well it’s not like he can blame  Rin;  Rin knows him by heart, he probably already knows he was going to make fun of him for that.

“Nothing. You look like you’ve just had a very satisfying orgasm you  kn-“

"SHUT UP!"

Sousuke gets  h it by  Rin’s phone and his room mate disappears from his view as he gets into his own bed.

Rin, is a an idiot. What a mistake. What a terrible mistake to leave  Sousuke with  his phone.

He waits for  Rin to sound  fast  asleep and, as soon as he is certain he won’t get caught, he takes  Rin’s phone and sends a text. To  Nanase.

_ 'It was nice talking to you. Why do you never call me?' _ He writes. 

He hesitates a little, considering it might very well change  Rin’s life or his relation with  Haru \- and, with him, in case this were to be a failure. But he is sick of watching  Rin playing around and being shy and awkward about it, when, really, it wasn’t that hard to see the way Nanase looks at him.

He sends the message. He waits, the answer isn’t long to come - as expected.

_ 'I never know what to say.' _

Sousuke is evil. He knows that.  Rin will probably hate him but, oh well, why not after all? If  Rin doesn’t feel ready to take the big first step then  Nanase is going to wait an eternity.

_ 'How about  you talk about how much you love me?’ _

This will probably make waves. But considering these two idiots are the only one not awa re of how they felt for each others,  Sousuke thinks the should be given a medal for that. He doesn’t expect an answer any time soon, and so, bored after a few minutes of waiting, he begins to read old messages sent between  Rin and  Nanase.

They aren’t a lot. It’s weird.

It’s only talking about swimming and meetings at Makoto’s - oh,  Nanase has answered.

_ '…' _

Nothing really thrilling. He wonders why  Rin likes that guy so much - no, he doesn’t just like him, he loves him. It’s written on his idiotic face with big, red, shining capital letters every times he sees him. It’s so obvious that  Sousuke even gets irritated when  Rin blatantly denies it.

There is a lot of hesitation in the texts they have sent to each other.  Rin always starts the conversation about casual or uninteresting  subjects \- small talks, w eather talks - and he can almost picture  Nanase struggling to find an answer to keep the conversation going. It looks like he is trying so hard but eventually fails each time. It looks like they really, really want to talk to each other but at the end of the day, they are too tense, too scared of their own inaptitude and so sure that they will mess this up that they choose to not speak at all. It’s such a shame.  Sousuke hopes it’s going to change now. He hopes  Nanase will find the words this time, that  Rin will finds the guts to confess, that they will finally talk together as much as they desperately want to.

Rin’s phone vibrates again. The man is still peacefully asleep on the bottom bunk, having no idea of what his best friend is doing behind his back - saving his ass, probably.

Nanase’s answer is miles away from all the possibilities he could have thought of.

_ 'I like you more than mackerel.' _

Now matter how many times  Sousuke reads  it,  and  rereads it,  he can’t find anything positive getting out of  this message.

The guy is just even more useless than  Rin is already. This was an impossible task from the start.

Well, at least he had tried, hadn’t he?

He erases the conversation and put the phone back on  Rin’s bed.  Sousuke falls asleep quickly after that. He hopes  Rin dreams of  Nanase, of a way to make him understand how much he loves him, so he can stop being annoyed by how pathetic the situation is.

 

Call it fate or not, the next day at lunch, there is none but one dish, waiting or them in the cafeteria.

“… Mackerel…”  Rin says, in an exasperated tone.

"Why are you so mad at the fish?"  Sousuke takes one bit of bread. “He didn’t eat your boxers.”

"No it’s not…it’s just… Haru …”

Yeah of course, it had  to be related to  Nanase, to  be able to  affect  Rin that much. Anyway.

"He loves mackerel _ so much _ . Like you have no idea, he is  _ completely and utterly obsessed _ by mackerel, like, I really think that if he could _he would marry_ a mackere l \- HEY SOUSUKE ARE YOU ALRIGHT DON’T CHOKE ON A FISH BONE!”

His lips are close to turning all blue when finally he manages to spit out the small bit of fish that had gotten stuck down his throat. Really,  Sousuke thinks at that moment when the room stops spinning, these two will definitely be the death of him.

**Author's Note:**

> I was kinda disappointed that Rin wasn't mentionned to help Nagisa on the ep 5 but, we only have 20 minutes so...x)  
> (Oh and, the chicken and knife thing is a french idoms, I think, and I couldn't find a good translation) (laugh laugh laugh all you want) (french is beautiful !!)


End file.
